The transformation of the energy sector

News Alert: August 2, 2015 at 5:02 PM

CLIMATE:

White House toughens clean power targets, will require CCS

The Obama administration will compel the nation's power fleet to cut nearly one-third of its carbon emissions by 2030, deepening reductions and increasing incentives for renewable power. The White House also will require new coal-fired power plants to employ carbon capture technologies, but at a lower capture rate than previously proposed.

The final Clean Power Plan that President Obama will unveil tomorrow afternoon at the White House will require today's power fleet to cut CO2 emissions 32 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 -- an increase from the initial target of 30 percent in the draft rule issued in June 2014. It assigns states' reduction responsibilities based on three building blocks: heat-rate improvements at coal plants, a shift from coal to natural gas use and renewable energy. Click here to read this Greenwire news alert.

EnergyWire headlines — Friday, July 31, 2015 — 8:41 AM

Update:
August 1, 2015 at 3:01 PM

CLIMATE:

White House axes efficiency from state clean power targets

U.S. EPA's final Clean Power Plan will no longer base state targets, in part, on estimates about how much they could boost energy efficiency, an administration official said. President Obama on Monday will release the final rule for existing-power-plant carbon emissions that does not include the draft version's "building block 4," the official said, reconfiguring the way states are assigned emissions reduction responsibilities. Click here to read this Greenwire news alert.

SPOTLIGHT

Royal Dutch Shell PLC began drilling in the American Arctic yesterday evening, shortly after the company's icebreaker, MSV Fennica, left a Portland, Ore., repair dock where it has been delayed by Greenpeace protesters.

TEL AVIV -- Ilan Barda knows how to protect the electric grid from cyberattacks, but he doesn't understand the rules of baseball. America's favorite pastime may not seem to matter for Barda, whose office in Israel's high-tech capital is strewn with cords and hardware rather than sports paraphernalia. But the CEO of cybersecurity startup RadiFlow says he could use a baseball lesson or two as he pursues the U.S. market for industrial cybersecurity.